Greenwood's Spiritual Side

One thing I like about Urban Sketchers outings is that they take you to new places. This past weekend, I got a chance to experience the 'spiritual' side of Greenwood.

First stop in the itinerary is the Sakya Monestary, a Tibetan Buddhist temple set in the middle of residential area. Several things caught my attention right away: the bright colored exterior, the bell-shaped stupa (chorten) with the prayer wheels, and the snow lion statues, among other things. I whipped out my iPad with procreate app for this one. The lion statue was drawn using a continuous line drawing method. The stupa is such a prominent feature that I drew it twice. I sketch all linework on site then add the colors later on.

The Stupa (Chorten) with Prayer Wheels, and Snow Lion Statue

Sakya Monastery building and Chorten

I walked a couple of blocks to the next stop, St. John The Evangelist Catholic Church. This time, it's analog time with my trusted papermate marker and moleskine sketchbook. I applied the same method that I use to sketch interior spaces – I reduced the scene into basic shapes without worrying too much about the correct perspective. It turned out to be more challenging than I thought; I miscalculated the height of the tower, and got caught up in detailing the brick texture. In the end, I decided to go back to the basic and not stressing out about the little mistakes. After all, urban sketching is all about 'capturing the essence of space'. In the end, it turned out to be a pretty productive sketch outing.

St. John The Evangelist Catholic Church

Two Houses of Worship in Greenwood

8/11/18 Sakya Monastery

Sixty-eight degrees with overcast skies! Ahhhh!

Despite my relief that the heatwave had finally broken, I was still miffed that this morning’s forecast called for rain and even thunderstorms. Couldn’t the rain wait until after our sketch outing? In fact, it did wait until the throwdown, so we all stayed dry while sketching the Greenwood neighborhood.

Our sketch outing featured two places of worship within a couple of blocks of each other: The bright yellow and red Sakya Monastery of Tibetan Buddhism and St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church. I’ve sketched the monastery’s front entrance flanked by twin lions before, so today I went for the large bell at the side of the building. The bell is surrounded by stands of percussion instruments that make a soothing rattling sound when spun. Arriving before the other sketchers, I had seen someone come out of the monastery, walk around the bell and spin the instruments before stopping for prayers at the entrance.

Sketching St. John’s was a second attempt for me, too. More than five years ago I stood on the opposite side of the church and struggled with both the perspective and watercolor. At least I didn’t have the challenge of watercolor this time, but the perspective was no less a struggle. Giving it a shot with Eduardo Bajzek’s graphite method, I had a new difficulty: trying to make sense of the confusing values. The brightest spot on the building was the barely visible left face of the mitered top (the curve reflecting the sky), yet the sun (hiding behind thick clouds) was lighting the right side of the rest of the church.

8/11/18 St. John the Evangelist Church

The weather report didn’t scare away any sketchers! In fact, we welcomed several new faces, including Gigi, who was visiting all the way from Rio de Janeiro (front row, second from right).